Simply saying WordPress is a website building platform and operating system. Be it any kind of website blog or online, you can aesthetically build a website with WordPress. Due to flexibility and intuitive specialities, WordPress is one of the most popular Content Management Systems (CMS).  It is used by more than 37% of all websites. 

What really is WordPress?

WordPress is a free open source content management system tool for building and managing websites. It includes WordPress themes and WordPress plugins, that helps to create a website on your own and even customize the website according to your preference respectively. WordPress is not only for blogging websites as it used to be in their initial days. Now , WordPress supports all kinds of websites such as blogging, eCommerce, digital products, Learning Management System, Job Boards, media galleries and much more. 

Where can I Get WordPress themes and WordPress Plugins?

As WordPress efficiently runs online, users do not have to download and install any software. The WordPress market is very big. You can easily get the free and premium WP themes and WP plugins in WordPress Directory/Market. 

For free WordPress themes and free WordPress plugins you can search in WordPress.org. There you can get thousands of free WP themes and plugins of your choice. Even though free WP themes have limited features and options, some of them are excellently well to create full fledged websites. 

Likewise, you can get premium WP themes and Plugins at Themeforest, Template Monster, Code Themes and so on. Make sure you choose the best one for your website projects.

If you do not have any idea regarding WordPress, WP theme and WP Plugins, you can always hire a WordPress developer for your website building projects.  But make sure they have years of experience working in WordPress. 

Why should you use WordPress for your website?

By now, you might have got some knowledge about WordPress and why it is so popular CMS for website development projects. 

Even some of the business giants are using WordPress for their online presence. Such as Sony Music, BBC America, The Walt Disney Company, The Rolling Stones, Katy Perry, Angry Birds, Playstation Blog to name a few. 

Without any further delay let’s check out why you should use WordPress for your website.

1. WordPress is free 

Yes, you can easily get free WordPress themes from any type of niche focused to multipurpose in WordPress.org. Simply download the WordPress theme and you can create a website in a matter of minutes. 

2. WordPress themes

WordPress  features thousands of free and premium WordPress themes in the internet market. You will get every kind of WordPress theme for your project. All you need is to select the best one WP theme that suits your needs. 

3. WordPress Plugins

Like WordPress themes, there are tons of WP Plugins. Generally, WP Plguins helps to add features in your websites and also provides customization options. WooCommerce is one of the most popular eCommerce websites which lets you add all the eCommerce functionalities in your website. 

For page builder options WordPress plugins like Visual Composer, Elementor, Beaver Builder and so on are helpful. 

4. Multilingual

As WordPress is a popular platform worldwide, it impressively supports 160 languages worldwide. Which means your website easily supports multiple languages and helps to reach global audiences.  WoW, isn’t it amazing? 

5. Compatible with Third Party Tools

One of the best parts of WordPress is it is effectively integrated with third party tools. Such as plugins, widgets, payment gateways, google analytics, forums, and so on that makes your website more engaging as well as functional. 

6. Rocket Speed

Do you want to reduce the bounce rate and increase the faster  user experience of your website ? WordPress is just like a “Flash of DC movies”. It has numbers of components and features that helps to boost the speed of the website. Such as WP plugins to compress the image size, lightweight WP themes that have not heavy codes, Gzip compression, advanced caching, and minifying CSS and JS files. 

7.  User-friendly

You do not need to be a tech guru to work on WordPress. Just a basic knowledge of computers is enough. As WordPress offers tons of beautiful and functional themes, any one can create a full -fledged website. 

8. Responsive

All of the WordPress themes are responsive, which means they easily adapt any screen and resolution size. No matter which type of device you use, laptop, ipads, tablets, mobiles, your website looks and loads exponentially well in every one of them. 

9. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)  Friendly

SEO is the strength of any type of website and that is what it takes your online presence into the next level. So, SEO is the one that you should really keep an eye on while operating online business. Thanks to WordPress, as its themes are already SEO optimized. Which means you do not need to work much in the onsite SEO. 

Similarly there are various SEO plugins or extensive tools that help to determine the SEO strength of your content.  Most of them are freemium one. But you can easily use the free one to do the basic SEO things. 

10. Support

Technological things are unpredictable. Never know when you need support or guidance from the expert to solve the technical glitches.

Since WordPress is a popular website building platforms, WordPress enthusiasts have been publishing more than enough tutorials, guides, tools, and resources on the internet. You will probably get the solution to your problem. 

Likewise, there is WordPress Forum where you can communicate with the WordPress users and take advantage of it. Likewise you can also hire WordPress Expert or other WordPress based companies for your issues. 

11. Security 

No doubt, WordPress is a highly secured and safe platform for website building. It has some features that enhance your website security like passwords protection for folders contents and so on. 

Similarly taking advantage of WordPress updates helps to keep your website secure from security threats and off bugs. 

Additionally, you can also install WordPress security plugin, and WordPress backup plugin to stay on the safe side. 

12. Easy to create Content and publish 

One your website is live and ready to world on the internet, you have to work on the content side for SEO and for your online presence. 

Simply go to Posts>Add New> Start writing> Add Images and Publish it. 

You can use various formatting tools, text editors, headings options, media options and much more. One of the best parts is you can embed Instagram photos, YouTube Videos, SoundCloud, Tweets and others by just pasting the URL in the Post editor. 

You can also keep your content in draft and schedule the publishing time.

13.  Improvements

WordPress enthusiasts are doing their best to improve the WordPress. They are adding new features, themes, plugins, extensions, more customization options, which makes WordPress better as the year passes by. 

14. No Coding knowledge is necessary

Yes, you don’t need to be a perfect code developer to create a website with WordPress. All you need is to download the WordPress theme and follow the instructions provided in its documentation. 

Some of the WP themes contain a handful of demo websites along with One Click Demo Importer options. Which means you can easily import the premade demo website, add image and content and your site is ready to roll. 

15. Testimonials

Testimonials are necessary in every online preferences and business as it helps to gain the trust from the users. It is also one of the product selling strategies. There are WP Plugins and widgets that show the customer testimonials and reviews in your home page. 

16. Multi User Option

Multi User Option is perfect for those types of website where there are more than one users who run the website.  There are different roles options to assign to different people. 

• Super Admin – This user has total access to website features.
• Administrator – This has access to the administration features only.
• Editor – This role enables the user to publish their own/other posts. Also, the user has power to approve or remove the posts of other users as well. 
• Author – Here, the user can publish and manage their own posts.
• Contributors – The user can write the post but they cannot publish the content. The post can only be published after getting the approval from the administrator. 
• Subscriber – The users who have authority to view and edit their own profile They are the users with their own account. 

17. Social Media Integration

Nowadays, the audience can easily comment on the website with your social media accounts. All thanks to WordPress. With the social media integration features, WordPress has made it happen. 

18. Highly Customizable

Why has WordPress gained so much more attention? Because WordPress offers theme customization options which allows the user to make a use of theme as they have preferred to create a website as per their preference. From this premium WP themes are best as they contain lots of features and can be extended if needed. 

19. Use as membership or affiliate marketing website

You can create an affiliate marketing website, can refer the products and services to your community. What are the benefits, well, you can get the certain percent commission from each sale and really monetize your website. There are a handful of WP plugins that help you create a affiliate marketing website. 

20.  Easy to Updates or Manage

WordPress is very easy to manage. You do not have to write complicated code for that. You can easily update WordPress, themes and plugins right from the Admin Dashboard. 

To make the things more easy for the users, WordPress will notify about the updates right on the Admin panel  and a single click is enough to update that version. 

21. WordPress Dashboard

All the WordPress users have the same dashboard in every theme. Users can easily add other features in the dashboard like starts, comments, updates and so on. 

Ways to use WordPress

Many people think that WordPress is just for the blogging platform. But you can easily create different types of websites. From a very simple website to full fledged professional and online business websites. 

But before that there are certain things you need to start with WordPress before creating a website

1. WordPress Hosting 

Hosting is the one that makes your website live on the internet/web. It provides space that you buy on a web server to store your website data and files. Such as Bluehost, Siteground, dreamhost and so on. 

2. Domain Name

Domain name is what your users type on the web to search and reach your brand. Make sure that domain name must be relevant to the purpose of your business or brand.  And it should be catchy and easy too. 

3. Free or Premium WordPress themes

You need a WP theme to start your website. There are lots of free WordPress themes in the WordPress directory. Frere themes have limited options and features but get to start with the business. If you need a fully functional and powerful website then you have to select premium WordPress themes. 

Below are the guidelines what you need to follow while selecting either free or premium WordPress themes:

• Awesome eye catching design that makes your website stand out of the crowd
• Flexibility
• Customization Options
• User friendly, and easy to navigate
• Compatible with the current version of WordPress
• Compatible with WordPress plugins
• Demo websites
• Great support and development
• Lots of features and functionalities
• Documentation

4. WordPress Plugins

Plugins add extra functionality and features in your website. There are some essential WP plugins that you need to install before developing your website. 

• WooCommerce Plugin for eCommerce or product selling websites
• SEO Plugins (Rankmath, All in one SEO and Yoast SEO)
• WordPress Backup Plugin 
• Akismet Plugin (to prevent your website comment section from spam comments)
• W3 Total Cache (for better caching solution for your website)
• Jetpack (to add many features)
• Ninja Forms (for adding contact form and other  additional information forms)

So, these are the things that you need before starting a website. Now let’s take a deep look into what types of websites you can create with WordPress. 

1. eCommerce website

Yes, you can easily create an eCommerce website with the help of the best free and premium eCommerce WordPress themes. With the help of WooCommerce plugin, you can easily sell the products digitally in any part of the world. Likewise there are various payment gateways options like PayPal, Stripes, Fastspring and so on.

2. Music Website

Katy Perry, Beyonce, The Rolling Stones, Sony Music and other popular musical artists have created their music websites with WordPress. You can add your albums , tour performance, and events right in your website. What’s more, you can further turn your music website into an income generating website by selling event tickets, accessories, albums and so on. For that select that music WordPress theme that is compatible with WooCommerce. 

3. Business website

Yes, you can show your business through the online presence to the unlimited audiences worldwide. With WordPress you can easily create any  business or brand website in a matter of minutes to show your services to the audience. 

4. Directory Website

Directory websites are very popular as people  use them to find the restaurants, theaters, offices, services and so on. All you need is to find the best WordPress directory theme that contains all the features that a directory website should have.

5. Portfolio Website

No other platform can create a portfolio website better than WordPress. You can  showcase your portfolio of work and design with the help of stunning image galleries, and beautiful sliders. Furthermore the visually appealing portfolio themes and robust user experience makes your work unique from others and your audience easily browse and know your talents. 

6. Job board website

These days job board websites are getting popular. Many popular names like Smashing Magazine, Problogger are monetizing their job board website with WordPress and its features. With WordPress you can efficiently develop niche-focused job listings or recruiting websites in short duration. Similarly, there is a very powerful plugin called WP Job Manager Plugin which provides extra functionality to your job board websites. 

Not only that, you can turn your job board website into an income generating commercial website. Well, you can charge your client by paid listing or job posting. So start collecting your revenue. 🙂

7. Personal or Blog website

WordPress was initiated as a blogging platform and developed into CMS. And from the very beginning to now, WordPress has done so much in the components for this blogging and personal platform. Such as clean design, polished, added powerful features, timely update, and much more. You can create content from the post editor and add different media to make it more attentive. Even if you want to keep your journal persona, then you can keep your content private. 

8. Forum or Online Community websites

WordPress allows you to create your own social network / forum websites. With the help of bb Press plugin, you can easily add categories, threads, and post replies in your forum or online websites. 

Additionally, there is another plugin called BuddyPress which works just like Facebook, which allows you to integrate social media features like profiles, groups, activity streams, comments, chats, notifications, friend connections, private messages and much more in your website. 

9. Question Answers website

Want to create something like Quora, Yahoo Answers etc website? With WordPress you can create community question and answer sites to build intensive communities. 

10. Non-Profit, Charity and Religious websites

If you are willing to create a charity, religious and non profit website, WordPress is the best choice.. From free to premium charty or non-profit WordPress themes in the WP directory, all you need is to find the best WP themes for your project. 

Not only that, you can create charity or religious  events with the help of plugins, sell the accessories via WooCommerce plugins and accept payments and donations from multiple payment gateways like PayPal, Masters Card, Stripes, Fast Springs and so on. 

11. Education/ Online Course Website

WordPress offers the great intuitive features for education based websites. With the help of Learndash Plugins and Learning Management System (LMS) Plugin, you can build and  run online courses just like Udemy. It allows you to add features like course content, handling subscriptions, running and grading quizzes, sell courses, accepting payments, to name a few. 

12. Photography website

Want to showcase your photography skills to the world? Well Instagram is not only such a platform. With WordPress themes and plugins, you can create mesmerizing  and attractive picture galleries websites in a matter of minutes. What are you waiting for?

13. Membership website

Membership websites mainly focus on the advertising and affiliate mareking that helps to monetize the website. You can use membership WordPress themes and plugins like MemberPress and ARMember to create a website. These plugins are very easy to use and contain a handful of components. 

What are you waiting for? Simply allow your users  to pay for premium content, features, components, and access to your exclusive community.

14. Article library website

Article libraries are mainly articles, press releases, journals, researches and other online texts. You can start your article library either with the niche focused WordPress themes or any other multipurpose WP themes. 

15. Niche focused Affiliate Marketing website

Affiliate marketing helps to monetize the revenue of a website making it income generating commercial website. Referring to a product and getting a commission from each sale has really boosted the earning of the website. There are tongs of WordPress plugins that enable you to launch affiliate marketing websites.

16. Podcasting website

Most podcasters are using WordPress based websites for podcasting.  Search Podcast WordPress theme you will surely get the one that suits your needs. 

17. News website

Some famous news agencies like BBC America have also used WordPress for their online news portal. Search the suitable news theme on the internet, create a site based on that theme and publish genuine and fresh content to roll your news website in the web world. 

18. Coupon website

Coupon website is just like affiliate marketing website. Take advantage of WordPress themes and plugins to create a coupon website and generate coupons. Simply  add, manage, and expire coupons right from the Admin Dashboard. Likewise, You can also earn through affiliate marketing by providing different coupons and codes to their products and services and referring them to your users. 

 19. Multilingual Website

WordPress supports 160 Languages, which means you can create a multilingual website to reach any community of the audience in the world. 

 20. Online Magazine

Gone are the days of spending money in printing and distributing costs of your online magazine. With WordPress, simply add the content, and images to run your online magazine. To generate the revenue, you can charge your users for the subscription plans or even start affiliate marketing and advertising. 

21. Review website

With WordPress start a product and service review website. Many youtubers are earning doing just like that. You can create your own community and add reviews of any services. If you wish to, you can also add videos too. 

22. Advertising or Classified website

These types of websites are one of the best ways to monetize your website. But you need to reach out to the users as much as you can. And your advertising website must have ranked well in the Google Search Engine. For this, you need to select the WordPress themes that provide enough advertisements space. Likewise, you can also use WP advertising plugins. 

23. Vlogging website

No doubt, WordPress easily supports multimedia. If you want to, you can create our own YouTube like website without doing much. Or you can also use WordPress  for vlogging website ofor your travel, food or anything. 

 24. Gaming Website

To create a gaming website the platform must contain lots of powerful features as gaming portal websites need huge amounts of visual content, forums, media, optimization, speed, and advertisement, banners and so on. Free WordPress themes do not contain these types of features for sure. You need to go for premium gaming WordPress themes. 

Make sure your premium WordPress gaming themes contain features like launching stream options, gaming clan, list of your matches, eCommerce store to sell game cards or games, garmin widgets, social sharing options to name a few. Some of the best WP gaming themes are Arcane, SquadForce, PlayerX, Game Addict and much more. 

25. WordPress Wiki and Knowledge base

Looking for some special platform to share your skills to the audience. Take advantage of plenty of Wiki based WordPress themes and show your skills of cooking, DIY, mechanic or anything to help others from your work.  

 26. Hotel Website

You heard it right you can even launch a hotel website with WordPress. There are lots of hotel WordPress themes and booking plugins in the WP market. With the hotel website you can add services, room type, room availability, even booking options, and payment options. Some of the WP hotel themes even offer single room displaying options to give the detailed information of their room types and service to the guests. 

27. Travel Website

Travel websites are the best platform  to showcase  the images of different destinations and lure the travel lovers. . Use WordPress travel theme for creating travel websites, adding images and travel costs. Use WooCommerce to sell the travel packets to the users. Voila. 

So these are the websites that you can create with WordPress. There are other kinds of websites apart from the ones that are mentioned in the list above with WordPress too. Such as Comic Book Website, Q&A Website, Web Chat Website, Contest Website, Help Desk Website, Confession Blog, Family Blog, Private Blog and so on. 

Having a WordPress website is not enough. You need to keep it secure as well. Below is the brief information on how to keep your WordPress website secure from the hackers. 

How to keep your WordPress website secure and safe?

It is unsure what hackers are upto and what they are planning next.. They mainly target the common and easy flaws of websites for hacking. 

Why do you need to keep your WordPress website secure?

• Critical damage to your business, revenue as well as reputation
• As hacker could steal your information like username and passwords
• Hackers can easily install malicious software and also share malware to your users
• Sometimes you have to pay a very handsome ransom to the hackers just to get your credentials and other informations back
• Sometimes you may lost your website as well

So, to prevent yourself from this worst happening, it is necessary to keep your website secure and stay on the safe side. You can follow the instructions below:

• Selecting the best host
• Keeping themes and plugins up to date
• Using strong passwords, keep it changing at least once a month
• Using Password manager
• UsingSSL to encrypt data
• Securing website from the Admin Dashboard
• Securing  wp-config.php file at any cost as it contains essential data
• Setting directory permission
• Blocking hotlinking
• Using two-factor authentication for WordPress security
• Back up the website reualaury 

These are some basic and advance possibilities are the knight in the shining armor for your website and business. 

Some of the Essential Pages of the WordPress website

These pages are the one that reflect your business and must be audience centric. This is where your content creating job really starts. They are:

• Home Page/Landing Page
• Policy Page (Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, Refund Policy,)
• About Us Page
• Contact Page
• eCommerce Product Showcasing Page
• FAQ

Conclusion

So, this is what the WordPress is all about and what can you do with it. It is quite hard to understand the whole thing in the beginning but you will eventually get used to it. There are lots of tutorials and resources online that help you to make things easy with WordPress. 

WordPress is mostly known for its simplicity and flexibility. So creating a website with WordPress is far easier than other platforms. The best part is you don’t have to write a single line of coding. And there are lots of extendable options available.  And now you must already be familiar with the kinds of websites that you can build with WordPress. And always remember to keep your website safe from the hackers. I hope this article has covered what you’re looking for. 

What is WordPress used for?

Basically WordPress is a website creating platform. It is very user-friendly and flexible and allows users to create a website without writing a single line of coding. 

Is WordPress for free?

Yes, WordPress is free. It is published under the GNU General Public License (GPL), which means it is free to download,  edit, customize, and use.

Who should use wordpress?

Any one who is willing to create a fully functional website (any kind of website) should use WordPress.

How much does it cost to use WordPress?

WordPress is free. You do need to spend a penny. Unless you have to buy premium themes, plugins and other features for your website projects. 

Is WordPress a framework?

Not really.

What is CMS?

CMS means Content Management System. It is the software that manages all the content and used while creating a website.